The Graduate

Peace Out, Pre-K!!!

I can't believe my little sweetpea is going to Kindergarten this Fall! Time really does fly when you're having fun. I'll post pics from graduation later today.

And they're off!!!

Because Coach and I are such stellar role models, we decided to take the Knuckleheads to the horse track on Mother's Day weekend and teach them how to place a bet and play the odds. We're all about having well rounded kids. Learning to gamble is an important life skill...no?

It was actually Family Fun Day at Lone Star Park and was very kid friendly, with lots of fun activities for the little ones. We did place a few bets (we won a whooping $1.28 on Little Miss Know It All), but we spent most of our time riding ponies, hanging out at the petting zoo and jumping from one bouncy house to the next.

This little Knucklehead got more excited about the races than I expected! He spent a lot of time going over the odds, circling his picks and I even caught him doing lots of finger crossing during the races! It was hilarious and a bit troubling.

Coach did a bit of his own studying of the odds and information. Despite his research, I convinced him to bet on The Girl's A Saint to win it all...she didn't.

Despite our losing record on the track, we had a great day. The kids got to experience a new adventure and we all got to get out and enjoy some of the beautiful Texas sunshine!

The best part of the day was when I returned home to find that my sweet little family had taken me away for the day so some fancy landscape company could come to our house and surprise me with totally revamped landscaping! They weeded all my flowerbeds, trimmed all the shrubs, pruned the trees, put in new hydrangas (my favorite!) and annuals, added new mulch, etc. It was the PERFECT Mother's Day gift for me. I had a great day out with the family and someone else did all the hard work I had been dreading for weeks!

Looks like I was a big winner after all!!!

Summer Mode

Woohoo....there's only 17 days until the kids are out of school for the Summer and Coach just finished up Spring Ball! I don't know who is more excited, me or them. I love the freedom that Summer brings the Gridiron Gang. We spend the majority of the year in overdrive, but soon we'll have our time to just relax and have fun.

The kids are already in Summer mode. It's getting harder and harder to get them out the door for school each morning. They're requesting popcicles, playing in the sprinklers and even went swimming for a few hours last Sunday. The pool is still a little chilly for me, but they were more than ready to take the plunge. The temps are supposed to reach the 90s this week, so maybe by this weekend I'll be ready to join them. Until then, I think I'll just grab a big glass of sweet tea, head out to the hammock and wait.

Dancing in the sprinklers

Road Food

Looking back through our holiday photos, it didn't take me long to realize why most of my Spring clothes are a little more snug than I remember....

We made a lot of trips from our current home in Texas back to the motherland (Louisiana) during the holidays. There were several trips to Natchitoches to see my parents and then a couple of trips back home to New Orleans. If you didn't know, there is no shortage of good places to eat on the backroads of Louisiana. You won't find any golden arches, but you will find lots of delicious home cookin'.  Even the service stations have better food than most fancy restaurants in other states. I'm not kidding. The plate of fabulousness above came from a rundown old gas station in Zwolle, LA. Somebody's granny is in there cooking up some good ol' Southern comfort food 7 days a week. We stop in every time we go home.

Then there are these golden hunks of numminess:

Deep Fried Corn on the Cob and Chick-a-bobs

(deep fried chicken, smoked sausage, onions and bell peppers on stick)

A roadtrip to New Orleans in not complete without a greasy tray of deep fried goodness!

And of course being a born and bred Natchitoches girl, it just wouldn't be a trip home without a few Natchitches Meat Pies!

So yeah, I totally earned these extra 5 pounds and they were so worth it!!! Whoever said "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" hasn't been on a roadtrip with me!

But now that Summer is almost here, I'm trying to do a little better....

I know, I know....That's a lot of bacon, but life just isn't worth living without bacon. I really am trying to do better. My last post was about asparagus for goodness sake!

Baby steps.

Asparagus!

The Gridiron Gang recently discovered that we love asparagus. We had some delicious grilled spears at a family cookout last month and have been eating tons of it ever since. I've been roasting some in the oven with a little olive oil and Tony's, and it is SO GOOD! Now that we know we love it, we're ready to branch out and try some new recipes. So, if any of you loyal readers or occassional lurkers have some great asparagus recipes to share, we'd love to give them a try!

Distracted

I keep meaning to post about my husband crashing up the Mom-Mobile, my little Knucklehead getting his front tooth knocked out, me blowing up my KitchenAid mixer, the lawnmower that quit working just when I needed it most, and all the other craptastical things that have been happening around here. Just when I sit down to tell you all about it, I get distracted...Distracted by all the little blessings that make me realize all that other stuff isn't so important.

I have some new recipes to share and tons of fun photos are downloading as I type. I'll be back later, but right now I'm going back to play in the dirt.

Good thing the lawn mower is broken, I can enjoy these pretty weeds one more day!

Trying to Catch Up

Since my friend, Miz Janey, has insisted in her "teacher voice" that I get back to blogging pronto, I figured I better get something new posted right away. I finally finished the yearbook. (THANK YA, JESUS!)
If I ever raise my hand to volunteer again, I seriously hope someone will slap me. I spend the majority of my time doing projects for other people and rarely get around to finishing all my own projects. No more, I tell ya! For those of you who know me well, stop rolling your eyes. Seriously, NO MORE VOLUNTEERING. 

Now, on to more fun things...

My little scout earned his Tiger Cub badge on Monday night and bridged over to the Wolf pack. He is very excited about all the new projects he gets to work on. My eccentric little genius is all about projects. He loves to study, create and tinker...Cub Scouts is perfect for him! In other Knucklehead news, he has given up baseball to tackle tennis this Spring. He's having a blast learning the game and he's pretty good too. I loved watching him play baseball, but I'm secretly thrilled that we don't have that major time commitment to deal with right now. Baseball = 4 nights a week / Tennis = 1 night a week. (So YAY!) 

As for my sweet little Punkette, she seems to get taller, smarter and more beautiful by the day. I can't believe it's time to get her registered for Kindergarten in a couple of weeks! She's only making the age cutoff by 5 days. Although she'll be the youngest in her class, she's more than ready. I think having a super smart older sibling that loves to spend time with her and help teach her new things has been wonderful for her. She's already reading like a champ and loves doing math. Sorry to brag so much...but it's true! I have some totally awesome kiddos, who drive me bananas on a daily basis, but I wouldn't trade them for anything in the world! They are just growing up too fast and I want to slow down and savor every moment. Remind me of that when I'm feeling guilty for not volunteering anymore!

Coach is busy with Spring Training. The team looks better and stronger than ever before. They seem to be really focused and I can tell they all have a championship on their minds. I love Spring Ball. It's the most relaxed time of the year for a coaching family and there's so much possibility for an exciting season ahead. Of course, Spring Ball also means we only have a few weeks until we're off for the summer! I've been counting the days until Summer break since January.

As for me, I've been booking a few photo sessions here and there. Haven't been able to get out a lot with all the crazy weather (such is the life of an outdoor photographer), but things are definitely starting to pick up with the beautiful Spring days we've been blessed with lately. I finally got my garden planted and am thrilled to see new things spouting up everyday. I can already tell I planted too much basil again, so all my friends and family can get ready for another Summer of abundant pesto! Not that too much pesto is a bad thing. Yummmmmmmm, pesto.

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter. We did! The little Knuckleheads wouldn't slow down long enough for a nice Easter pic, so the above photo is as good as it gets this year. The cobbler's children had no shoes....The photographer's children had no fancy photos.

~Gridiron Girl

Back from Spring Break

We had a wonderful Spring Break in New Orleans! We celebrated my birthday, enjoyed a couple of our favorite St. Patrick's Day parades, ate lots of yummy food, went to the Audubon Aquarium and the new Insecterium. We ate Snoballs, rode the streetcars and the ferry, visited St. Louis Cathedral, played in the parks my kiddos loved so much when we lived there and just enjoyed playing tourists. I literaly took hundreds of pictures! I'll share a few now and be back later when I have time to upload some more.

Sorry I have been so bad at keeping up with the blog lately. As I've said before, I have a bit of a problem with over committing myself. I really do need a twelve step program for people who volunteer too much. My latest little (yeah right!) project is the design and layout of my son's school yearbook. This project has been on going for months, but there's finally an end in sight! However, it's going to be a busy couple of weeks to get everything finished before the deadline. Most people usually have a yearbook staff for these big projects....I am a staff of one. (I kinda like it that way.) Did I mention that in addition to my over-volunteering issues, I also have a few control issues and perfectionist tendencies? We'll have to delve deeper into that when I have more time.

In other news, Spring is definitely in the air around here. My seedlings are starting to sprout and there are little green buds on the trees. I'm so excited! I hate winter being cold. I'm so ready to thaw out and get outdoors again. As soon as I wrap up the yearbook project, I promise to have lots of fun new stuff to add to the blog. I have tons of photos to upload, some fun gardening projects to tackle and a big birthday trip to The Big Easy to document next week!

I hope everyone has wonderful weekend!!!

~Gridiron Girl

Spinach Bacon Penne Pasta from Savory Sweet Life

When I saw this recipe for Spinach Bacon Penne Pasta over at Savory Sweet Life, I knew I had to make it immediately. Pasta, spinach, bacon, cheese...what's not to love? Alice's recipe sounded perfect just the way it was, but I'm not capable of following a recipe without messing around with it a bit. As with most things I cook, I ended up making it as fattening as possible. (I know I'm terrible, I'm working on it...kinda). Since I'm not cured of my evil pork fat lovin' ways just yet, I substituted half the olive oil with bacon grease, I added a splash of heavy cream, tossed in some red pepper flakes and heaped on some extra Parmesan. It was FABULOUS! I highly suggest you give it a try. The healthy version or my artery clogging concoction, the choice is yours. Either way, give it try, it's YUM!

Coach gave it two thumbs up and the Knuckleheads cleaned their plates, spinach and all!

Crafty Kids ~ Bird Feeders

I used to make these peanut butter bird feeders when I was a little girl. As a matter of fact, the wooden cutouts are some extras that my Daddy made for me years ago. Over time, they worked their way to the bottom of my big craft bucket. I was thrilled to rediscover them in a cleaning frenzy a couple of weeks ago and knew the kids would love this fun little project.

And I was right...they loved it!!!

Fat Tuesday

Happy Mardi Gras!!!

More Snow Pics

We were so excited about the little amount we had in the previous pictures, we had no idea we would wake up to this the next morning!

Coach got ambushed in the Great Snowball War of 2010

I've never seen snow like this in our little corner of the world. It was BEAUTIFUL!!! It didn't last long, but we sure had fun while it was here. It was a nice little treat, but now I'm ready for Spring. I honestly don't see how people put up with the cold, slush and sludge for extended periods of time.

This Southern girl COULD NOT HANDLE IT!